The use of inserter systems, such as the Series 9 Inserter Systems manufactured by Pitney Bowes Inc. of Stamford Conn., is well known. Such inserter systems are used by certain organizations for assembling large amounts mailpieces for dispatch through the postal system. Examples of such organizations are: banking institutions, utility companies, insurance companies, credit companies, and the like. Typically, such organizations create documents, such as billing documents, in a mainframe computer system that is separate from the inserter system that will process the documents into such mailpieces. Each batch of documents is generally referred to as a “mail run”.
Generally, inserter systems have processed mail runs based on control codes printed on the documents being processed. Early versions of the inserter systems recognized limited control information, such as first document of a mailpiece and number of documents in a mailpiece. Later versions evolved into more sophisticated control applications, such as prioritized selections of optional inserts.
Most recently, inserter system technology has evolved to include the processing of a mail run based on an electronic data file, referred to herein as a mail run data file (“MRDF”) that is generated off line from the inserter system, for example, by the mainframe computer, which created the mail run documents. The MRDF is a file containing individual mailpiece records for all the mailpieces in a mail run. Since the inserter system performs document tracking for each of the mailpieces based on the mailpiece record in the MRDF, the inserter system can verify the mail run integrity against the MRDF. Thus, the inserter system can detect duplicate mailpieces, missing mailpieces and can provide a summary of such detections.
Such inserter systems that implement an MRDF commonly utilize existing batch processing applications, typically referred to as ‘legacy’ systems because they are relatively old systems handed down from previous generations of company management. However, these systems still are effective and often control processing of data relating to a core element of a company's business, such as bill production. Such legacy systems for mass mailing document production run on a main frame computer are complex and expensive, and mailers are reluctant to modify, upgrade or replace these critical document generation applications.
Generally, high volume mailers that process large mail runs on a continuous basis use several inserter systems in parallel to achieve a desired, high volume, mail run rate. However, each one these several inserter systems are commonly not of the same manufacturer. For example, some of the inserter systems may be manufactured by Pitney Bowes Inc., well others may be manufactured by third party vendors such as Bell & Howell, Böwe or Kern. Wherein each of these third party inserter system requires its own native MRDF. Thus if a high volume mailer adds third party equipment relative to its existing inserter systems, modification of how the MRDF is generated would be needed in the mailer's mainframe computer. But, as pointed out above, mailers are reluctant to do this in view of the complexity and cost involved.
Therefore, the control of multiple inserter systems running a single mail run has been limited to controlling each inserter system separately from one another. Such control requires an inspection of some type to verify the integrity of the completed mail run. Thus, such high volume mailers have given up the mail run integrity associated with the MRDF processing on multiple inserter systems.
It is thus an object of the present invention to provide MRDF processing using the multiple inserter systems while not requiring modification of the mailers legacy mainframe computer. It is a further object of the present invention to achieve the same level of mail run integrity for a mail run processed on multiple inserter systems as would be achieved if processed on a single inserter system.